Freud, Sigmund
Freud, Sigmund Born May 6, 1856, in Freiberg, Austria-Hungary, now Příbor, Czechoslovakia; died Sept. 23, 1939,in Hampstead, near London. Austrian neuropathologist, psychiatrist, and psychologist. Founder ofpsychoanalysis. Freud studied medicine at the University of Vienna, where he received his M. D. in 1881. From1876 to 1882 he worked under E. Brücke in the Vienna Institute of Physiology; there Freud becameacquainted with the ideas of H. von Helmholtz, whose views on energy he later applied topsychology. In 1885–86, Freud worked under J. Charcot in the Salpětrière Hospital in Paris. He wasa professor at the University of Vienna from 1902. In 1908, together with E. Bleuler and C. G. Jung,Freud founded a yearbook of psychoanalytical and psychopathological research, and in 1910 hefounded the International Psychoanalytical Association. He was awarded the Goethe Prize in 1930.After fascist Germany’s seizure of Austria in 1938, Freud emigrated to Great Britain. Freud’s early works were devoted to the aphasias (1891), infantile paralysis (1891–97), and thephysiology and anatomy of the brain, including the localization of brain functions. He was one of thefirst to discover, in 1884, the pain-relieving effect of cocaine; this discovery stimulated research onthe use of local anesthesia—as applied, for example, by the Viennese ophthalmologist C. Keller. Inthe early 1890’s, under the influence of the French school of psychotherapy (Charcot andBernheim), Freud began to study the neuroses—and especially hysteria—as diseases that had noapparent organic substratum. He also studied psychiatric treatment methods and theirpsychological bases. Together with J. Breuer, Freud studied the psychological mechanisms ofhysteria, and he proposed the cathartic method of psychotherapy, based on abreaction—that is, therelease of unconscious traumatic experiences under hypnosis. In 1895, Freud began to work on the treatment of neuroses by the psychoanalytic method, basedon the technique of free association and the analysis of errors and dreams as a way of penetratinginto the unconscious. Freud was among the first to investigate the psychological aspects ofsexuality. He viewed sexual development as consisting of several qualitatively different stages,each being the potential source of unconscious conflicts that are manifested in such forms asneuroses or perversions. According to Freud’s general theory of psychology, proposed by him in theearly 1900’s, the structure of the psyche may be compared to an energy system; underlying thissystem is the conflict between different psychic levels—primarily between consciousness and theelemental unconscious drives. In a mistaken attempt to broaden the sphere of application of psychoanalysis, Freud sought toextend its principles to such areas of human culture as mythology (Totem and Taboo, 1913;Russian translation, 1923), folklore, and the creative arts; he even explained religion as a specialform of collective neurosis (The Future of an Illusion, 1927; Russian translation, 1930). Freud’sviews, considered in their overall ideological development, evolved from “physiological materialism”and the mechanism of the Helmholtz school to the assertion of psychic autonomy and toanthropological constructs that are akin to naturalistic variants of the philosophy of life. Theinfluence of Freud’s ideas ranges over a very broad spectrum of thought in bourgeois philosophyand sociology. WORKS Gesammelte Werke, vols. 1–18. Stuttgart, 1966–69. In Russian translation: Psikhopatologiia obydennoi zhizni. Moscow, 1910. Tri stat’i o teorii polovogo vlecheniia. Moscow, 1911. Tolkovaniesnovidenii. Moscow, 1913. Lektsiipo vvedeniiu v psikhoanaliz, vols. 1–2. Moscow, 1922. Osnovnye psikhologicheskie teorii v psikhoanalize. Moscow-Petrograd, 1923. Ocherki po psikhologii seksual’nosti. Moscow-Petrograd date. Ostroumie i ego otnoshenie k bessoznatel’nomu. Moscow, 1925. Izbrannoe, vol. 1. London, 1969. REFERENCES Wittels, F. Freid: Ego lichnost’, uchenie i shkola. Leningrad, 1925. (Translated from German.) Zweig, S. Sobr. soch., vol. 11. Leningrad, 1932. Wells, H. K. Pavlov i Freid. Moscow, 1959. (Translated from English.) Jones, E. The Life and Works of Sigmund Freud, vols. 1–3. New York, 1953–57. A. V. BRUENOK and D. N. LIALIKOV